Pallet
by Ready To Flyxxx
Summary: マサラは まっしろ はじまりのいろ "Masara is the color of pure-white beginnings." Origins.


**_マサラは__まっしろ__はじまりのいろ__"Masara is the color of pure-white beginnings."_**

A girl stands hand in hand with her father, their figures huddled close as they stand upon the frosted hillside. The wind whistles through her auburn hair, and its wispy touch causes goose bumps to appear on her skin. The grip on her hand tightens.

"Papa?" It's quiet for a moment, her father stuck in some sort if thought. The winter air is cold, and dead, but also alive in the way it moves. She wonders, absentmindedly, if people are like that too.

"Yes honey?" He answers after some time. The trees are bare, and lifeless, their branches covered with a sheen of frost. The wind picks up, blowing through the empty trees.

"When will I finally be able to go on my pokemon journey?" His grip tightens again, and she sees his eyes widen. But it's only for a moment before his eyes glaze over once again and the vacant look on his face returns, as lifeless as the trees.

"Delia," his voice rings out slowly, warningly, "you know how dangerous it is."

"But Papa!" her fists ball up, and she looks at him pleadingly. Her brown auburn hair has been tangled into knots, and her eyes of that deep golden amber shine with desperation. She looks so much like her mother in that moment.

"Enough! Now, come here." Her father orders stern and unwavering like the Oak trees that decorate Pallet's rich soil. Reluctantly, she obliges, her petite frame joining once again with her father's. He holds something out to her in his glove clad hands, and gingerly places it into her own.

"What's this?" Delia opens her fingers to reveal a seed. It's small and brown, but emits some kind of power.

"A seed. An Ash Tree to be exact"

"What do I do with it?"

"You'll know, when the time is right." And he takes her in his arms back to the house, the wind howling on. Snowflakes slowly drop and descend down to the earth, and the seed feels warm in her hand. But if you look close enough you can see the first bud of a flower start to bloom. The residents of Pallet Town seem to feel it, the sudden change in the air, like something is born.

* * *

><p><strong><em>"Shades of your journey await!" <em>**

Delia is reserved, and practical like her mother but also headstrong and brave like her father. Her voice is as clear as a summer's day, her laughter bright like the sun. She spends her time basking In the light of a new day, as if she is herself was made from the winds of summer themselves. Her heart longs to be a trainer, and she could make it too, perseverance is in her blood. So she enrolls herself into Professor Oak's classes. That's when she meets him. Alluring, and mysterious he introduces himself to her, as a real gentlemen. He is tall and composed, with well-kept brown hair, and a dazzling smile. And just when Delia thought she would never lend her heart to anyone, she falls in love. Giovanni, the name rolls off her tongue as she is instantly smitten. Unknowingly to them, the summer air goes cold, and the rustle of wind through the full trees stops. "It's a pleasure." She says and offers him her hand. He's good to her, showering her with gifts and treasures. Filling her head with promises of love. He offers her the world, his world. And one day she returns the favor, and creates for him their son. But she is young, and scared because she can't return to her home with a child, so much shame would be brought upon her family. So he welcomes her, with open arms into his. A dark cloud looms overhead. Summer has never been colder.

"You can have the world," he tells her, "anything your heart desires! Train with me my dear,and you'll finally have your dream! Join the new generation of pokemon trainers: The rockets!" He shows her the house of horror, the abuse, and the torture of pokemon. She sees them be ripped out of innocent trainer's hands, and given special devices to enhance their power. She sees the sadistic look in her lover's eyes, the un-altruistic gleam. "Money, Power, Fortune! You can have it all!" That's when she takes their child and leaves. And she runs and runs and runs until her lungs can't take it anymore and she falls into a dirty heap on the ground, her heart palpitating and sobs wracking her body. She is far too scared to return, far too scared to tell the authorities. So she changes her name to something simple: Delia Ketchum. And she herself is one with the trees of pallet blooming with colors of change. She sends her son away, free from the clutches of Giovanni. And with one last kiss upon his head, her son, Red as she calls him, is free. She tells no one, as she heads back to Pallet, tears streaming down her face.

* * *

><p><strong><em>"A Tranquil Setting of Peace and Purity"<em>**

She arrives in town with a pleasant smile marking her face (a mask really), as her legs carry her down the familiar path she once walked as a mere child. Through the orchards, down each pristine row as the pungent aroma of rotten fruit fills her nostrils sending a painful feeling of nostalgia to course through her. The trees rustle their leaves to her, their skeletal branches reaching out like hands, sharp pointy ends like jagged finger nails clawing at her throat. One of them snags against her shall causing it to rip. She shrugs her shoulders away letting it fall to the ground and hurries back to the house of which she used to live. The wind howls, calling her name, (a warning).

"Mama? Papa?" She enters the house's embrace, face peering in from the door. There is no answer. She is met with an empty house and an empty feeling in her chest and her life has been drained from her leaving nothing but vapid lifelessness. The world she once knew has fallen asunder. Professor Oak tells her that her mother had passed and that her father, not being able to take the loss of both women in his life (her included), had left without a word. She is left in her mother's will the house from which she was born and the restaurant her mother had worked. She stares at her mother's grave, fallen to her knees and clutching her heart until it begins to rain. And it rains, and rains, and rains for many days, while Delia is too broken to even cry. The leaves turn grey that year.

One day she finds a man who treats her well. He's a trainer, traveling around each region collecting pokemon and, sleeping on the ground with the night sky as his only blanket. He's a wandering soul meandering through the ends of the earth through fire and water and all other elements created by Arceus himself, searching for everything and nothing and just plain living. A fluke trip to pallet brings him to her, and for a moment the world stops. "Now what's a pretty gal like you doing sitting all alone here?" he asks her in a light voice. She looks up at him through unimpressed (dead) eyes, and says nothing. But, he doesn't give up and instead, holds his hand out to her, offering a small smile. "How about I tell you a story, huh?" She takes note of his dark messy hair, dirt and grass stained clothes, and lopsided grin. She smiles this time.

"Sure, why not." So he does. He tells her stories of heroic acts and bravery, stories about a boy who came from practically nothing, stories of promises and heartbreaks, adventures and misadventures (stories she never got a chance to have). He tells her _his_ story, and _his_ dreams as she listens intently, her heart swelling. Cherry blossoms the color of her cheeks fall around them, in circling the two in a world of pink as if Arceus sent a blessing to her from the sky. For once she feels _happy_. And it's (almost) enough to forget about all the hurt, and all the tragedy. And it's what she _needs_. So they are married In the spring, and together plant the seed of the tree her father once gave to her. She receives news of her pregnancy as the green of the tree pokes through the earth's soil.

* * *

><p><strong><em>A Pure White Beginning"<em>**

Ash. The baby boy is named after the tree. He takes after his father, her husband, his eyes a deep chocolate brown and his hair the color of ravens. She swears she'll never let him go, never make the same mistake again. This time, she's ready. Snow falls the night of his birth, a white blanket sitting untouched out the window.

But when Ash is five, her husband leaves. "Honey, I just...can't. Every time I come here, back home, it's amazing but when I look back into the vast open spaces, and the endless skies, and the freeness of it all...I remember why I left in the first place." She understands, and she hears her father's voice in her head, his deep baritone words warning of the dangers. She wants him to have what she never got.

"Go." She tells him. Maybe he'll return to her one day and can share his stories with her once again. But Ash grows on without him, too young to fully understand what has happened. (Too young to understand many things like why his mother always dresses him in blue instead of red or why his grandparents never visit). But he is Delia Ketchum's _child_ and the sun shines brighter with his laugh, and when he cries Pallet Town rains, and when he looks out the window out to the mountains and hills the wind blows in its direction pulling him with it. She sees it in his eyes, the look of a caged pokemon (the same look of his father). It makes her terrified. Because she can feel it in the air when Giovanni curses her. When her past is gaining on her as she run from this forever game of cat and mouse. The way she must always quiet herself down by counting 5...4...3...2...1...counting down what she'll never know. And It scares her to death to think that one day she'll be alone (again). Because when he will tell her his dreams of becoming a pokemon master, she will let _have_ to let him go. She'll have to give another loved one away. She has to give everyone away. But for now, the grip on his hand tightens.

The wind howls through the ash tree as it grows. _Delia._

**_?_**


End file.
